Dirty Harry's Balcony

We hit the trail around 9:45/10AM and headed through the yellow gate, as instructed by previous reports. Unfortunately, despite having a map, we ended up walking all the way to the Fire Training Academy, at the end of the road. So we somehow massively missed the side trail for Dirty Harry's Balcony. Luckily, this wasn't too bad of a detour and we weren't too worried about time.

When looking for the trailhead, it's about 0.5 miles up the road on the right-hand side, marked by two large concrete blocks. This is the only marker and it is possible to miss, like we did. So keep an eye out!

Most of the trail is going straight up an old creek bed, which is a bit hard on the feet. I wouldn't do this in regular tennis shoes, that's for sure. My dog seemed to navigate it pretty easily as well. There are pretty streams running on either side at a couple different spots and a really pretty waterfall that you have to cross, which was at full blast in early April.

About 2.8 miles from the TH, you'll reach a fork in the road. Look out for the tree in the middle, which has a bunch of cairn's to the right. Head that direction for another 0.2 miles and you'll reach the balcony, which has spectacular views of McClellan Butte, Mount Washington, and Mount Kent. There was some snow dusting the sides of the trail around 2,000ft up; nothing in the way though.

The balcony is a bit small, so it was perfect for two people and a pup. Definitely some wind up there as well, but totally worth it. I loved how close the mountains felt up there...just reach out and touch 'em!